This is not real: These photorealistic scenes were created with Unreal Engine 4

Gamers have long been promised “realistic” graphics but to date, not much has really come close to delivering photorealistic imagery. Epic Games’ Unreal Engine 4, however, may very well be the first.

The popular engine has been available to the gaming community for over a year now and is being utilized in the development of AAA titles like Street Fighter V and EVE: Valkyrie. It’s the latest screenshots and footage from Unreal Engine forum user Koola, however, that has the Internet buzzing.

As you can see for yourself, it’s genuinely difficult to determine if Koola’s creations are real or computer-generated.

Epic Games launched Unreal Engine 4 at the Game Developers Conference in March 2014. The company took a unique approach to the launch, offering the engine via subscription model to help put it in the hands of anyone interested in building games.

A year later, Epic dropped the subscription model and made its engine completely free to use via revenue sharing.